In the process of shipping one or more articles from one location to another, a packer typically places some type of dunnage material in a shipping container, such as a cardboard box, along with the article or articles to be shipped. The dunnage material partially or completely fills the empty space or void volume around the articles in the container. The dunnage material thus prevents or minimizes movement of the articles that might be damaged during the shipping process. Some commonly used dunnage materials include plastic airbags and converted paper dunnage material.
Some void-filling dunnage material also is suitable for use as a cushioning wrap that can be used to separate fragile articles or to surround fragile articles in a protective wrap. An expandable, slit sheet packing material may provide one type of cushioning wrap. The sheet material, such as paper, has a plurality of rows of slits across a width of the sheet and when the sheet is pulled in a longitudinal direction transverse the slits, the sheet reduces in width and increases in length and thickness. This stretching and increase in thickness of the slit sheet paper packing material is referred to as expansion. The thickness of the slit sheet paper packing material can increase by an order of magnitude, or more, relative to its original thickness, when stretched. This increased thickness allows the expanded material to serve as a protective cushioning wrap material for articles. Slit sheet paper packing material, and the manufacturing thereof, are described in greater detail in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,667,871 and 5,688,578. The cushioning wrap material formed with expanded slit sheet packing material may include a layer of sheet material, such as a lightweight tissue paper, that acts as a separator sheet between layers of the expanded material. The separator sheet prevents openings in the expanded paper from nesting in a flatter configuration or becoming interlocked.